2 week old only gained 35g in 12 days - so stressed

[tenar]

You're getting great advice here, I'll just add my voice to the chorus.

70ml is heaps to express at once at this stage. I happen to have very good supply of milk, even an oversupply. In the first couple of weeks I couldn't express more than 20ml at a time (now I can get 150ml or even more sometimes). I would not be doubting your supply at all.

By the way little things like whether she was weighed before or immediately after a wee or a poo will make quite a difference in how much she weighs at that moment, so she could well have put on more weight than the measurements suggest.

In the first few days, while we were in hospital, DD had a bit of jaundice. So we had to feed her 3-hourly to try to clear that from her system. Some things we did to wake her up enough to feed were:

- don't let her sleep for too long without waking for a feed

- feed one breast, then change the nappy to wake her up, then offer the other breast

- express a bit of milk so there's a drop on your nipple, and try to get this into her mouth so she gets the taste of it and remembers there is milk to be had if she sucks

- stroke her head to wake her up, stroke other parts of her

- gently wipe her head with a cool wet cloth to wake her up (yeah, it seems mean, but it worked for us - I called it "bugging the baby into feeding more").

- If you are using the normal, front hold, tuck her bum in closer to you to get her to suck again with more enthusiasm. No idea why this works, but it helped us. It was a suggestion of the breastfeeding advice midwife in the hospital.

I hope your worries about this are over soon.

[Taurean]

Great news! Izzy gained 40g in 3 days!!!! It's not huge but enough apparently and a very 'nice' gain. We are heading in the right direction again. I also managed to express 110ml on one sitting thus morning - 80ml out of one side! So my supply doesn't seem to be an issue. I'm so happy!!

All the advice you girls gave me was fantastic and the words of encouragement really gave me that confidence boost I needed. Thank you all so SO much

ps we had over an hour of skin on skin breastfeeding in bed this morning. It was beautiful and so good for both of us. We will be doing it more often.

[Fuzzywuzzy]

Woohoo! That's awesome, keep up the great work!